There’s bumper-to-bumper traffic that can stress out drivers, and then there’s the “Lord of the Flies” traffic snarl that former Tucson-area lawmaker Jonathan Paton and his wife endured after Christmas in California.
A snowstorm held hundreds of motorists hostage Thursday and Friday on California Highway 58 approaching the Tehachapi Pass, east of Bakersfield, and among them was Paton and his wife, Angie Kebric Paton, who were stuck huddled in their Toyota Prius for more than 12 hours on the highway, along with truckers and families.
The Patons posted several times on their Facebook accounts about the ordeal:
“People. Are. Freaking. Out,” Jonathan wrote at one point. “This is crazy.”
Travelers were in the middle of nowhere, and there were families with children without food and water and no bathrooms, recalled Paton on Friday afternoon.
As the hours ticked away, frustrated motorists had to draw upon their survival instincts.
“It turned into ‘Lord of the Flies’ when you turn around and see a group of women peeing by the side of the road by a semi-truck, and on the other side of the road there are little kids gathering snow so they could have something to drink.”
Paton, who now lives in Scottsdale and is a contract lobbyist, is a native Tucsonan. He is a former state Republican senator who in 2012 ran for Congress in the newly formed 1st Congressional District but was defeated by Ann Kirkpatrick, a Democrat.
“We finally got through it and are in Victorville, California, at the Corner Cafe,” said Paton on Friday afternoon. “We spent the night on the highway, just stalled for 12 plus hours,” said Paton, who had just finished eating a hamburger while Angie sipped hot tea.
“We’re free (for now),” Angie wrote on her Facebook account posting a video of their car traveling down the highway, with bumper-to-bumper stopped traffic in the opposing lanes.
The Patons were vacationing and were traveling from Monterey to Los Angeles when their pleasant trip took a turn.
“It took us from Monterey to get to Mojave 24 hours. It was stop and go and when we got to the (Interstate) 5 it was announced that it was closed completely,” said Paton. Motorists were parked on the side of the road and highway patrol troopers told us to “get out of here and go onto the 58, and it took us 12 hours to go 30 miles,” he said.
“It was 32 degrees, super cold and it makes you appreciate a lot of other things,” Paton said.
The couple stayed bundled in their Prius. “A lot of people were just shivering.”
In a Facebook post, Paton said police officers came by at one point and told everyone to prepare to get moving, “that was 2 hours ago.”
Paton said the area needs overhead electronic signs like the Arizona Department of Transportation has to let travelers know about weather and road closures or backups. He said the state of California also needs to invest in salt for the roads and road equipment to clear roads of snow.
He said the state also needs to offer “driving classes for those who need to drive in the snow. All those people who drive crazy here can just stay here. They don’t need to be in Arizona.”
The California Department of Transportation in a series of tweets detailed the road closures in the area and then the re-opening Friday. There did not appear to be any serious injuries or deaths related to the closure, according to tweets.
